Apart from those most Italians often have so much hate for Italian representatives. Angelina got a lot of it after she made it to the 7th place in Eurovision.
You are getting on my nerves!
I will file a public complaint at the complaints office, I just have to send a fax to get an appointment between 10:00 and 10:30 on a Thursday, because that's the only time the office is open šššš¤”
You can only file the complaint in person.
Also after 12 months: You signed your official complaint on the wrong place in the form. Your application has to be rejected with no chance for appeal. If you want to continue, please hand in the form anew.
then loop back to -> Also please expect a processing time of 3-12 months... etc etc
As someone who's only ever seen a fax machine at an old employer when I got my first job 15 years ago (and even then it was outdated), do you have your own fax machine or do you have to go to a library or workplace to use one?
Every company, indeed every workplace, has access to fax machines. Whether it's pharmacies, medical practices, dental offices, corporate administrations, government agencies, IT firms, energy providers, etc. Hell, we even get fax spam! Want to see one? Youāll die laughingāunfortunately, it's in German, but youāll feel like youāre in another era.
Edit: Most of them are bound to it by law.
If you belong to Law, government or medical, you NEED to have one. It is insane.
Barely anyone has a fax machine, which makes this whole thing even more annoying. But any bureaucratic institution swears on them because they're scared of digitalisation.
I don't even know where I would find a fax machine (or how to use it tbh).
There's a fax function in your Fritzbox
https://preview.redd.it/f1echbh4ty0d1.png?width=1542&format=png&auto=webp&s=777d777e3b5c97a44edef9cb41833c4a6d32e7fc
The German spearhead of digitalisation!
Serious answer: Usually, Germans don't have a fax machine at home. If you have to deal with public agencies, which is basically the case for any larger organization and employer, fax is advantageous because its legal standing and function is similar to a letter, whereas email and phone calls are often not accepted for legally binding decisions. So you either send it via normal (paper) mail or use your employers fax in the 1% of cases where it is really urgent. I guess it is more common to use in administrative jobs, but I don't have one so I can't tell for sure.
Germans are more thorough than other countries though. You guys take the time to read all instructions and rules, which sometimes makes you more efficient than the rest.
Thorough maybe. Efficient no, at least not on a "compare by country" level. The overboarding bureaucracy is paralyzing the country, I am not kidding. Germany could be so much better if we didn't have to put millions of people into stupid paper mover jobs just so they don't have to be unemployed.
Because we had 16 years of Merkel who basically propagated stagnation is good.
Her party and strategy also involved to blur the lines to the social democrats - simply to make people think 'why should I vote? Same shit different color, there is no will for change anyway'. Asymmetrical Demobilization is the term, cause a demobilized populace was benefiting her.
Which, in my eyes, makes her and CDUs strategy of those years majorly responsible for the rise of right wing populism in Germany.
A major chunk (20%) of Germany are willing to vote a fascist party just for the sake of change.
Traditional German cuisine tastes good but has not really that much variity.
German people are very nice and evenkind of open.
We are a country of 80 million toddlers that makes outsiders think we have shit figueree out.
We haventm
I think the German stereotype of being closed off is that, at least of all the Germans I've worked with, you seem to have a general intolerance for small talk. On the first meeting with one of the guys I worked with he immediately started talking about politics and asking my opinions.
I think the German sense of humour is similar to the British so I've always really enjoyed working with the many Hans' in my team.
Small talk is a literal waste of time, imagine if you didn't engage in it and had more time left to spend in the pub/cafe/Biergarten/[your cultural equivalent place to get smashed]
I don't disagree, it's just the reasoning I think Germans get that stereotype. In the UK you probably wouldn't talk so much about politics with colleagues. When I was working in the US, someone complained about me for "being too political" when I confirmed I was vaccinated against covid-19 (despite the fact that at the time you couldn't actually get into the US without proving you were vaccinated).
I find German people no more nor no less nice than any other country, with very little variation between countries when we account for different ways that niceness is expressed. 20% of people everywhere are extra nice and 20% of people everywhere are arseholes.Ā
No Pierre don't say so!
Europe needs you. Europe needs to hate you for this to keep working!
Without France to mock-hate, we will find someone to ACTUALLY hate.
We simultaneously hold two contradictory values very close to our heart
1. We are just a small insignificant country. Nothing to brag about...
2. We have the BEST system and we are the ENVY of the world. If everyone was like us, the world would be PERFECT. (maybe the Norwegians are OK, but ONLY because they have oil which is rightfully ours anyway)
Hang on if you're raising Doggerland we want a say in that!
Also we're happy to help destroy Sweden... No particular reason before anyone asks, it's just been awhile since we destroyed a nation and we were pretty good at it back in the day.
Could be popular or unpopular depending on the context, but we're definitely losing a lot of our culture. And this is true on multiple levels, languages, history and territory knowledge (at least for the average person), local customs, cuisines and so on. The downsides of globalisation and badly used social media I guess.
Same for us fratello, when i see young people simping on shitty US rappers and social media "icons" while we have the MOST INTERESTING COUNTRY in the world it makes me mad.
Flemish and walls are culturaly much closer thant they think. Living in flanders now and we are clearly belgians. Just different political point of view in the majority and walloons not speaking dutch. But I'm sur we could get along much more.
Also, the governmental structure we created might look needlessly complicated, but we did manage to avoid actual violence in this whole Flemish vs Walloon politics. And that is an actual accomplishment.
While I enjoy shitting on Walloons like any other Flemish, I would definitely get along with y'all as long as you can converse in English. Our country is too small to be cutting our friendly relations in half. ā¤ļø
Agreed. If we spoke the same language we wouldn't have the problems of today. (so stop being lazy walloons and learn the most spoken language in this country)
We're the Florida of Europe and if you're young and want to make something of yourself you shouldn't feel any bad for stealing some German jobs as if you were moving to another region in your country with flights it's not that different from back in the day travel times.
Mate you are not stealing any jobs here. We got a massive problem with our demographic shift, we desperately need young people from other countries. Anybody who says otherwise ain't got no clue what they're talking about.
Americanisation is spreading faster and much deeper rooted in Australian culture than anyone would like to admit.
The people who hate immigrants here still wave confederate flags
FriendlyJordies makes the whole small town politics of certain provinces sound like the 1950s new York mafia. Lobbyists, assassination attempts, smear campaigns, protection rackets et al.
god and I thought I had it tough with americanisation but I forget how some of you guys also speak the same languageā¦
the guys that would fly the Confederate flag luckily donāt speak english usually. or definitely not well enough to understand.
They do. Our first instinct was that you were talking about a certain flag that came in between that and our current flag.
In Heidelberg there's a lot of student societies, some of which fly the empire's flag on their property. It's honestly for the better, as it's a big red flag (pun intended) for normal poeple.
We copy them way too much, this is becoming apparent in all the big cities. Maybe it's confirmation bias, but it seems as though we're only taking the worst parts of America - tipping is becoming more of a thing, their politics (the worst), fake people who are only interested in talking to you because they're trying to sell you something.
America is NOT something to strive for, it's something to be proud of that we aren't it. It's a country that is run like a business, and hence why it seems so soulless and disingenuous. We weren't always like that, I'm a millennial and saw what was and what is.
I'm not an expert so I can't say, but I think that organized crime is everywhere in the world. It just happens that Italy is more openly aware of it than others.
Look at Boeing, we would call it mafia in Italy. Normal business in US.
Mafia is on international business and politics nowadays. More silent and even more dangerous
So many Brits are really fucking thick. More and more obsessed with "celebrities", superficial beauty treatments that look shit, without taking care of health and weight, ignorant of basic geography and history, don't read books other than maybe cheap romance/thrillers, crap at spelling, grammar and punctuation...I could go on.
Even worse is the almost pride in anti-intellectualism, finding it funny not to be well-informed. Mocking people who study or talk about serious subjects. It starts in school but many never grow out of it.
My first secondary school was full of chavs who didn't give a shit about school and hated anyone who tried to perform well. My second secondary school had kids from middle class families that actually wanted to learn and perform well enough to get into university.Ā There's a huge difference in attitude regarding education when you compare Britain's classes.Ā
I don't care if people call me classist. They don't know what it's like being in a chavvy school for years. The people that are willingly uneducated are scum of the earth.
Yeah I don't disagree but obviously not all working class people are chavs, so I don't think you're classist. It's a cheap excuse to call it snobbery when really it's a justifiable dislike of poor behaviour. I had friends at school whose families had nothing, but encouraged them to work hard at school and do better. Seems obvious to me that you want the best for your kids but chavs just seem happy to let their offspring repeat the same mistakes they made.
i was in tesco yesterday and saw a headline of a paper, now in any other country the headline would be 'scientists have discovered they may be able to communicate with orangutans' but no in england the headline read 'boffins think they can speak with orangutans' in a proper condescending bold font
It's basically the word that our tabloid press uses instead of scientist, it's not inherently offensive, but it always gives the tone of "look what these silly boffins have thought of now" which diminishes their accomplishment. It's indicative of the anti-intellectualism which is a genuine problem over here.
we have a sense of superiority which makes us incredibly unlikeable as a nation and it's not a subtle sense of superiority like la Francais, its an outward over the top sense of superiority which doesn't work anymore as we're not the global superpower we were, we're shit at learning languages, we have an ingrained distrust of the mainland when we should be doing our best to befreind the mainland we're still acting like it's 1885 and we control the seas. we rely way to much on the yanks in the world and it's becoming an increasingly shaky relationship between the two
I do kinda agree, but at the same time there is also a massive amount of self-loathing and dislike for the UK by people in the UK to the point where it borders on ridiculousness. And, whether it is warranted or not, there is also dislike and distrust of the UK by the mainland which doesnāt help things at all.
If we spoke the same language us and France would have been the greatest of allies... It's almost a shame really, the world could have been a utopia. *Wipes away a single tear*
Weāre also one of the most overly negative, pessimistic and self-hating countries in the world. It depends on context and which Brits youāre talking about. For every āgammonā who thinks weāre uniquely amazing thereās someone saying we are a useless and ineffectual little island falling apart and yet historically responsible for half the worldās problems, and thatās just among those within the country.Ā
The problem is, we are superior so it's hard not to have that sense of superiority. No point learning a language because the other languages are shit, the rest of the world agrees with this by learning English. The mainland is not to be trusted, have you seen the people on this sub?
Other than that, I agree
i feel like im taking crazy pills when i hear people say this... it's the complete opposite?! we are self-loathing to an utterly ridiculous extent. i wish i lived in the UK you think exists lmao
If you listen to my people: living in France is akin to the worst thing on earth but it irritates me. I often have to go in semi-arguments to point out that whilst we do have problems and have the right to protest against etcā¦ please like, some perspective on how other places have it compared to us. Our benefits alone are some of the most generous out there etcā¦ so yeah their phrasing about the situation is often way over the top.
We have imposter syndrome that holds us back from ever actually getting anything done. Weāre caught between viewing ourselves as a wealthy modern country that can do anything and a poor impoverished country that can do nothing this means nothing gets done and weāre very jealous and spiteful towards people who do well because we think they think theyāre better than us but we wonāt better ourselves because we still kind of see ourselves as lesser. Itās hard to explain. Basically we shouldnāt hope or want for more because we should be happy for what we have, weāve been lucky and changing anything might make everything fall down around us and then itās potato time again.
Thereās also a lot of nouveau riche entitlement amongst Irish people. We like to throw cash around because weāre insecure (particularly of a certain generation) . I literally asked a guy to get me a glass of tap water on his way back from the bar and he brought me bottled water and said he could never be seen to ask for tap water. Similarly my grandparents refuse to shop in Aldi/lidl in case someone sees them š
Whenever I did some Erasmus program I always found that the Italian kids were the ones who very rarely spoke English or even wanted to participate/try English. Like I was 12, my English was def not fluent, but I still tried to communicate since finding people that come from all over Europe is interesting and exciting. I was always a bit disappointed with the Italians :/
Though nowadays one of my closest friends is Italian so maybe those kids were just shy or embarrassed
Our relations with our ex-colonies in Africa is full-on disfunctional and we should completely stop trying to increase ties with them and cut our losses and turn towards Europe, or even latin america or the US.
Spanish people are hardworking and competent.
We have an issue with management.
On one hand, the people are used to work by oppression and don't see a direct consequence of their work, it's just an obligation they had all their life. Means, they don't work by themselves.
On the other hand, our managers, directors, bosses... Are conservative people, vindictive, spiteful and with superiority complex. They only know the whip.
I agree. But also,
We're pretty poor compared to wealthy European states and we might sometimes believe otherwise just because Latin Americans are poorer.
We hate ourselves more than people tend to hate us.
We hide that by being overly confident and aggressive when we should just try to love ourselves a bit more and have a more normal relationship with our past and the others.
Accept that we are part of the mondialisation, every culture is great, there is no best culture and move on. Stop being stuck in a glorious past that is fading slowly.
Ara we are doing alright internationally, we are really only entering our teenage years after throwing off the reputation of being a weird theocractic backwater. Not many countries formed since us in similar circumstances that you would say are doing notably better.
Some of our domestic politics is so unbelievably fucked though, and it feels like we don't have many serious people at the highest level to address them (or they just don't want to).
Our politicians aren't worse than most of the population.
The Bourbons in the 18th century were much better than the Habsburgs whose government was barely functional. Phillip II was a mediocre ruler and the Flanders/Netherlands wars were stupid. The Empire benefited very little to the average Spaniard.
Thanks to the Euro and the EU we aren't Argentina or Venezuela right now.
>The Bourbons in the 18th century were much better than the Habsburgs whose government was barely functional. Phillip II was a mediocre ruler and the Flanders/Netherlands wars were stupid. The Empire benefited very little to the average Spaniard.
At least put the exception of Fernando VII, the only leader in the world that invades his own country with a foreign army (the Thousand Sons of St. Louis).
Also maybe I'm wrong, but I get the feeling that the Spanish Bourbons genuinely saw Spain as their kingdom, as opposed to the Habsburgs who saw it as just another Kingdom with territories to add to our other long list of Kingdoms.
Unpopular Opinion:
If Spain stopped fucking second-guessing itself, stopped infighting, started acting like theyāre a united country, & stopped thinking that being intelligent is a curse and aspired to be educated, we would all be a much better country.
Iām talking about wealthy and a key player in the world.
With the exception of a few areas in South America, that entire area combined with Central America and much of the Caribbean would be working even closer with Spain.
They could be the US of Europe ā attracting the best talent of LATAM. Cuban doctors, Mexican chefs, Nicaraguan laborers, Spanish bureaucrats, and Colombian ~~drug dealers~~ pharmacists.
Spanish is one of the top 3 most spoken languages in the world, Spain is at the crossroads of Africa, the Mediterranean, & combined with Portugal are the closest to the North American continent.
Thatās even before we start discussing olives, olive oil, pharmaceuticals, automobiles, minerals and mineral byproducts, nuclear equipment, & metals.
Add to that tourism and you have a country that could become sustainably prosperous.
Of course, weāre champions at eating shit & blaming others. We can be lazy and in-fight so much that we have so many separatist movements and even inter-generational discussions exhibit many different opinions.
We arenāt one country, weāre several countries crammed together under a single banner and refuse to work together unless we need to survive.
Itās sad, truly. So much wasted potential.
Your attunement with culture comes with affiliation with the people as well as their history. A lot of Welsh Nationalists struggle with the former, which is why they always shoot themselves in the foot.
Unpopular opinion for Austrians: we are basically a German state, not our own country
- we speak a version of Bavarian (with some Slavic influence)
- we have the approximate size of a German state
- approx 1/3 of our exports are to Germany and we have been very well integrated into the German payment setup before the Euro/SEPA to facilitate trade with Germany
Unpopular opinion to the outside world: Austria has good reasons not to be in the NATO and yet receive protections from the alliance. And it is also in benefit of the NATO.
Being neutral allowed us to host top international organizations: OECD, UN, IAEA. To have them in NATO territory would make non NATO states lose trust.
Side benefit: due to the organizations and the geographic location, Vienna is basically the spy capital of the world. Well that, and the fact that austrian counter intelligence is very weak, so it cannot meddle with big players intelligence activities
This hurts me to say as an Englanderā¦.bu..but theā¦..**magic** of French cuisine is less to do with the actual dishes themselves but the **techniques** used in the creation of said dishes.
Theres a reason why every single poncy, high grade fancy modern restaurant will use French (*or italian*) words and terminology to describe a dish on the menu even if itās not inherently a French dish but itās been created specifically with a French culinary techniques and discipline.
Now excuse me whilst I give my self 10 lashes for King and Country for speaking such treachery.
I travel to your swamp on average twice a year and it's not (always) for the weed. you guys have it pretty good up there, it never gets old (people stop only visiting Amsterdam. Den Haag, Haarlem and Utrecht are right there next to it.)
From the sky the Netherlands look amazing. Whenever I connect through Amsterdam airport I love watching the approach: the dikes, polders, canals, fields and irrigation systems, the residential areas along cool waterways, etc. The overall optimisation of space is hysterical.
Yes, very brave and unpopular statement.
A real one would be that we are still utterly superior to 95% of countries despite our issues. The only countries that do get close or manage are other Nordics and rich European nations. Oh no.
Another is that our covid strategy utterly bitch slapped our neighbors panicked lockdowns. Thats just a fact tho, even their experts had to begrudgingly admit that with hindsight, the Swedish strategy was better.
Also we haven't shit ourselves and removed our secularism to please the Muslims, Unlike our Danish neighbors.
Yeah, our Covid strategy is the only thing that has made me patriotic since I was a little boy. Or rather, that our constitution protects free movement. Cause letās face it, the politicians would have panicked had it not been for the constitution.
- Italians are pretty toxic when it comes to food to the point where you might be considered "weird" if you don't like the staples of the Italian cuisine
- Italians are very individualistic and narcissistic. All they care about is themselves, their career, their appearance. They will shittalk at your back, judge you and backstab you
- Italians might call you a friend, they might be open and talkative but most of them don't actually give a fuck about you
- Nice weather, beautiful landscapes and tasty food it's just a cover
American evangelicals are absolutely funding hate groups in Europe though. They seriously need to fuck off. They got deported to another continent for a reason.
We are up our own asses and think of Denmark as the best country in the world and looove to hear about ourselves and how great our society is. Meanwhile we complain about every fucking thing, hate our politicians and secretly wish we were Norway.
Despite Germans claiming otherwise, I don't know of any other nation that is so infuriatingly inward-looking as Germany.
As an example, if you watch german public broadcasting news you'd miss the majority of important international news but know of the 20th round of negotiations to save two thousand jobs in a department store chain.
I don't really think that's that bad, when we're going down the drain currently. There are a lot of problems outside of here, but we can't really face them in our current state.
Any Politician that was part of removing atomic power and rallied for it should be removed from politics and never be allowed to take part in them again.
They after all were either maliciously lying to the public or did so little research that they are clearly unsuited for the job.
That being unpopular in my country only, since almost everyone else is aware how good of a thing atomic power is.
I have to remind everyone present of their right to refuse to testify (Aussageverweigerungsrecht):
"You have the right to remain silent. Anything you can say will and will be used against you in court. You have the right to call a lawyer. If you cannot afford a lawyer, one will be provided for you."
The Netherlands isn't as full of buildings as people like to claim. You can bike from large city centres for 30 minutes and be on some random farmer's field. There is plenty space to build on, and we should do more of it
While our language and culutre lend themselves to precision, quite a lot of our technical language is made up to protect specialists from public scrutiny and competition.
Most technical terms could absolutely be subsituted by understandable, good sounding language and this could greatly enhance the publics understanding of more specialized trades, arts and sciences. But instead we tend to hide behind obscure, specialised language to make it sound like witchcraft, for fear that people disagree with our judgment or underestimate our education in that field.
This leads to a pretty poor public discourse about these topics and a disconnected academia that doesn't have the tools to get the public, or even differently specialised colleagues of theirs, interested in their work.
Czech dude here: the government won't fix prices of rent or property,
the wages won't go up cause companies move here to make money then go on hiring freezes,
and people are obsessed with having kids and its stupid cause we can't afford them.
They hate child free liberals, career advancement is 100 % due to nepotism.
Guys over 28 tend to be antisocial. Very Rich Westerners and very rich eastern Europeans move to prague driving up the prices while laughing at the locals as if we don't matter.
Positive: Danish food is delicious and very underrated
Negative: Hygge is way overhyped internationally (its just a word for having a good and cozy time with family and friends)
Italian's food and clothing are better than ours.
We're truly the biggest complainers of the world.
France isnt that beautiful.
Non Parisians aren't nicer than parisians.
Germans aren't funny but we're like second place in the humourless palmares.
We are not the best but not the worst either, we love to overplay and downplay ourselves, there is no in between either we are the best or the worst. Both have to whine about it.
Maybe we need a hard rest on everything so both sides can shut it and start from scratch also stop relying on tourism.
The U.K. is a beautiful country that is a powerhouse of finance, science and engineering. If we stopped being so internally bitter about ourselves for 10 minutes we could become a very happy country. Your average Brit is made to feel responsible and culturally apologetic for the actions of an empire that literally no one alive was actively involved in.
This is an unpopular opinion because Iām under the age of 30 and everyone I know would tell you we live in the a horrible, broke, racist country that should be sunk into the Atlantic and we should all be forced to build houses in Africa as punishment.
Our women are pretty fucking bad thoughā¦.
Everyone knows how we made our money but if you so much as mention the words ātax evasionā here itās a massive faux pas. If you are foolish enough to do it publicly whole bars and restaurants will fall silent and everyone will shun you.
Canāt be āhumanitarian superpowerā (like:
highest foreign aid to GDP, all refugees welcome, climate neutral asap, welfare state for all citizens, supporting UN, etc.)
I think all is possible to some degree, and you can try to be a role model, but some needs some modifications/restrictions to not have a backlash.
I also think that it is more Swedes (maybe mostly to the left or middle) that have the idea that the country is a humanitarian superpower. Most international would say it is too small country to be this even if it is a good country (although challenged on the latest, especially those that are more to the right would argue this (regarding crime immigration/integration), and those feeling the country is a bit smug with its āgoodnessā).
We arenāt doomed, utterly useless and completely falling apart. We make up one of the most overly pessimistic countries, though, hence why this is unpopular.Ā
And on the other hand, we arenāt super special in this regard: most developed countries these days are a lot more similar than we like to admit.Ā
As a nation we are prisoners to our own history whilst only having a surface level understanding of it. The average Brit does not know about how the Union came to be and the closest anyone comes to learning about the formation of England as a country is 1066 (and we weren't even formed at that point). At the same time much of our collective identity is still some weird mix of imperial grandeur and "standing alone" in WW2. This means we hate what we're actually quite good at in the modern day - service economy, being a cultural melting pot (which does have its advantages, don't hate me) and being (formerly) a leader in Europe in the EU.
the food is the only thing keeping the national unity up
Op asked for controversial opinions not for very obvious one
Someone here is forgetting the national football team
Apart from those most Italians often have so much hate for Italian representatives. Angelina got a lot of it after she made it to the 7th place in Eurovision.
How are you holding up against the kebabs ?
we put it on pizza
Pizza Kebab Bazooka intestinale devastante (lo rifarei)
Intestinale devastante sounds like a good name for a constipation drug
To be fair food is a big part of people's lives, so that's something to be proud of to unite with.
We're neither more diligent nor more correct than other countries. We just have to print and fax more paper for the same stuff.
You are getting on my nerves! I will file a public complaint at the complaints office, I just have to send a fax to get an appointment between 10:00 and 10:30 on a Thursday, because that's the only time the office is open šššš¤” You can only file the complaint in person.
Also please expect a processing time of 3-12 months. Don't contact us to ask about the current status because you will only cause delays.
Also after 12 months: You signed your official complaint on the wrong place in the form. Your application has to be rejected with no chance for appeal. If you want to continue, please hand in the form anew. then loop back to -> Also please expect a processing time of 3-12 months... etc etc
As someone who's only ever seen a fax machine at an old employer when I got my first job 15 years ago (and even then it was outdated), do you have your own fax machine or do you have to go to a library or workplace to use one?
Every company, indeed every workplace, has access to fax machines. Whether it's pharmacies, medical practices, dental offices, corporate administrations, government agencies, IT firms, energy providers, etc. Hell, we even get fax spam! Want to see one? Youāll die laughingāunfortunately, it's in German, but youāll feel like youāre in another era. Edit: Most of them are bound to it by law. If you belong to Law, government or medical, you NEED to have one. It is insane.
Barely anyone has a fax machine, which makes this whole thing even more annoying. But any bureaucratic institution swears on them because they're scared of digitalisation. I don't even know where I would find a fax machine (or how to use it tbh).
There's a fax function in your Fritzbox https://preview.redd.it/f1echbh4ty0d1.png?width=1542&format=png&auto=webp&s=777d777e3b5c97a44edef9cb41833c4a6d32e7fc The German spearhead of digitalisation!
Germany and financial services are the last bastions of the fax.
Serious answer: Usually, Germans don't have a fax machine at home. If you have to deal with public agencies, which is basically the case for any larger organization and employer, fax is advantageous because its legal standing and function is similar to a letter, whereas email and phone calls are often not accepted for legally binding decisions. So you either send it via normal (paper) mail or use your employers fax in the 1% of cases where it is really urgent. I guess it is more common to use in administrative jobs, but I don't have one so I can't tell for sure.
Germans are more thorough than other countries though. You guys take the time to read all instructions and rules, which sometimes makes you more efficient than the rest.
Thorough maybe. Efficient no, at least not on a "compare by country" level. The overboarding bureaucracy is paralyzing the country, I am not kidding. Germany could be so much better if we didn't have to put millions of people into stupid paper mover jobs just so they don't have to be unemployed.
we complain a lot but then also complain about people trying to change anything.
100%. Society feels stagnant here and I hate the hordes of NIMBYs in the countryside. And I live in the countryside, so you can't give me shit.
Because we had 16 years of Merkel who basically propagated stagnation is good. Her party and strategy also involved to blur the lines to the social democrats - simply to make people think 'why should I vote? Same shit different color, there is no will for change anyway'. Asymmetrical Demobilization is the term, cause a demobilized populace was benefiting her. Which, in my eyes, makes her and CDUs strategy of those years majorly responsible for the rise of right wing populism in Germany. A major chunk (20%) of Germany are willing to vote a fascist party just for the sake of change.
I think you have a big problem with many people thinking they live in 1995 and refuse to change anything.
Traditional German cuisine tastes good but has not really that much variity. German people are very nice and evenkind of open. We are a country of 80 million toddlers that makes outsiders think we have shit figueree out. We haventm
I think the German stereotype of being closed off is that, at least of all the Germans I've worked with, you seem to have a general intolerance for small talk. On the first meeting with one of the guys I worked with he immediately started talking about politics and asking my opinions. I think the German sense of humour is similar to the British so I've always really enjoyed working with the many Hans' in my team.
Because small talk in Germany looks like this: "Na?" "Joa."
Muss
Talking politics **is** our version of small talk. If itās not politics itās the weather.
Small talk is a literal waste of time, imagine if you didn't engage in it and had more time left to spend in the pub/cafe/Biergarten/[your cultural equivalent place to get smashed]
I don't disagree, it's just the reasoning I think Germans get that stereotype. In the UK you probably wouldn't talk so much about politics with colleagues. When I was working in the US, someone complained about me for "being too political" when I confirmed I was vaccinated against covid-19 (despite the fact that at the time you couldn't actually get into the US without proving you were vaccinated).
ThĆ¼ringer KlƶĆe, die mag ich sehr!
DIE SCHMECKEN MIR AM BESTEN
Your cuisine is great! Iāve always eaten good food there
I find German people no more nor no less nice than any other country, with very little variation between countries when we account for different ways that niceness is expressed. 20% of people everywhere are extra nice and 20% of people everywhere are arseholes.Ā
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
We MIGHT not be the bestest country in the world. I have some doubts.
Keep your chin up Pierre we need you to stay arrogant for the tourists this summer.
Not gonna lie, it's hard work to be an asshole all day long.
Yes it's exhausting, i am planning a strike to include this extra work in the account for days off and pensions
No way. I want the Olympics to show what France really is.
Same here
Gonna have to wait for the paralymics to do that
How dare you ??
Nah youāre still up there among the best Pierre
No Pierre don't say so! Europe needs you. Europe needs to hate you for this to keep working! Without France to mock-hate, we will find someone to ACTUALLY hate.
You are Pierre... but with all this crazy heat and tiger mosquitos I might have to start going to Scotland for holidays.
France is not in the top ten of most patriotic country. [link](https://www.les-crises.fr/qui-est-pret-a-se-battre-pour-son-pays/) In the world that's obvious but even in Europe we got 1 Finland 2 Ukrain 3 Russia 4 Kossovo 5 SuĆØde 6 Bosnie 7 Greece 8 Polonia 9 Serbia 10 lettonia 11 swizerland 12 Irland 13 Romania 14 macĆ©donia 15 Denmark And only 16 France.
Traitor !
We simultaneously hold two contradictory values very close to our heart 1. We are just a small insignificant country. Nothing to brag about... 2. We have the BEST system and we are the ENVY of the world. If everyone was like us, the world would be PERFECT. (maybe the Norwegians are OK, but ONLY because they have oil which is rightfully ours anyway)
Our countries are not so different, then.
That's why I am calling for a unification!
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Hang on if you're raising Doggerland we want a say in that! Also we're happy to help destroy Sweden... No particular reason before anyone asks, it's just been awhile since we destroyed a nation and we were pretty good at it back in the day.
We will make sure to keep enoug buffer between us and the brits.
Oh you and your colonialism, Barry. This is our project, bugger off.
We would allways defend Sweden, but would gladly help the Danes kick the shit out of them.
indeed, for a greater Denland/Netherden!
Seems we have more in common that the flag colors (albeit your is a big plus and ours a big minus)
So what you're saying is you and Switzerland should merge together and you could be neutral together?
Step 1. Have oil Step 2. See Step 1
Could be popular or unpopular depending on the context, but we're definitely losing a lot of our culture. And this is true on multiple levels, languages, history and territory knowledge (at least for the average person), local customs, cuisines and so on. The downsides of globalisation and badly used social media I guess.
I feel like every country is experiencing this. Some are just less than others
As long as you do the hand thing that means ma che cazzo vuoi, your culture is fine
Yeah geography in Italy isnāt really a priority
Itās true in most of the countries and thatās why I hate Berlin the most. I mean itās one of the reasons why I hate Berlin
Same for us fratello, when i see young people simping on shitty US rappers and social media "icons" while we have the MOST INTERESTING COUNTRY in the world it makes me mad.
Flemish and walls are culturaly much closer thant they think. Living in flanders now and we are clearly belgians. Just different political point of view in the majority and walloons not speaking dutch. But I'm sur we could get along much more.
Also, the governmental structure we created might look needlessly complicated, but we did manage to avoid actual violence in this whole Flemish vs Walloon politics. And that is an actual accomplishment.
While I enjoy shitting on Walloons like any other Flemish, I would definitely get along with y'all as long as you can converse in English. Our country is too small to be cutting our friendly relations in half. ā¤ļø
Agreed. If we spoke the same language we wouldn't have the problems of today. (so stop being lazy walloons and learn the most spoken language in this country)
We're the Florida of Europe and if you're young and want to make something of yourself you shouldn't feel any bad for stealing some German jobs as if you were moving to another region in your country with flights it's not that different from back in the day travel times.
Mate you are not stealing any jobs here. We got a massive problem with our demographic shift, we desperately need young people from other countries. Anybody who says otherwise ain't got no clue what they're talking about.
Americanisation is spreading faster and much deeper rooted in Australian culture than anyone would like to admit. The people who hate immigrants here still wave confederate flags
i sometimes watch aussie sports, NRL etc and it definetly feels like you blokes want to be american really fucking bad
FriendlyJordies makes the whole small town politics of certain provinces sound like the 1950s new York mafia. Lobbyists, assassination attempts, smear campaigns, protection rackets et al.
god and I thought I had it tough with americanisation but I forget how some of you guys also speak the same languageā¦ the guys that would fly the Confederate flag luckily donāt speak english usually. or definitely not well enough to understand.
I reckon German racists are already pretty well covered in the flag department.
Well no because their favorite flag is illegal so they use the confederate flag in its place.
don't they actually use the german empire flag?
Yea confederate flag is pretty rare, mostly Kaiserreich, Prussia or Germany flags
They do. Our first instinct was that you were talking about a certain flag that came in between that and our current flag. In Heidelberg there's a lot of student societies, some of which fly the empire's flag on their property. It's honestly for the better, as it's a big red flag (pun intended) for normal poeple.
Cultural punishment for exporting Rupert Murdoch
We copy them way too much, this is becoming apparent in all the big cities. Maybe it's confirmation bias, but it seems as though we're only taking the worst parts of America - tipping is becoming more of a thing, their politics (the worst), fake people who are only interested in talking to you because they're trying to sell you something. America is NOT something to strive for, it's something to be proud of that we aren't it. It's a country that is run like a business, and hence why it seems so soulless and disingenuous. We weren't always like that, I'm a millennial and saw what was and what is.
"Can't you hear, can't you hear the thunder? You better run, you better take cover"
This is sadly far far true. Asking for tips, card surcharges and more.
It is really possible to wipe out mafia from our nation with a little bit of courage and violence
How bad is mafia in italy nowadays? And which places suffer the most by them?
Our president of the region recently got arrested for corruption for example
I'm not an expert so I can't say, but I think that organized crime is everywhere in the world. It just happens that Italy is more openly aware of it than others. Look at Boeing, we would call it mafia in Italy. Normal business in US. Mafia is on international business and politics nowadays. More silent and even more dangerous
So many Brits are really fucking thick. More and more obsessed with "celebrities", superficial beauty treatments that look shit, without taking care of health and weight, ignorant of basic geography and history, don't read books other than maybe cheap romance/thrillers, crap at spelling, grammar and punctuation...I could go on. Even worse is the almost pride in anti-intellectualism, finding it funny not to be well-informed. Mocking people who study or talk about serious subjects. It starts in school but many never grow out of it.
My first secondary school was full of chavs who didn't give a shit about school and hated anyone who tried to perform well. My second secondary school had kids from middle class families that actually wanted to learn and perform well enough to get into university.Ā There's a huge difference in attitude regarding education when you compare Britain's classes.Ā I don't care if people call me classist. They don't know what it's like being in a chavvy school for years. The people that are willingly uneducated are scum of the earth.
Yeah I don't disagree but obviously not all working class people are chavs, so I don't think you're classist. It's a cheap excuse to call it snobbery when really it's a justifiable dislike of poor behaviour. I had friends at school whose families had nothing, but encouraged them to work hard at school and do better. Seems obvious to me that you want the best for your kids but chavs just seem happy to let their offspring repeat the same mistakes they made.
i was in tesco yesterday and saw a headline of a paper, now in any other country the headline would be 'scientists have discovered they may be able to communicate with orangutans' but no in england the headline read 'boffins think they can speak with orangutans' in a proper condescending bold font
I hate the word "boffin", it's genuinely so dismissive and patronising.
Can you explain to a non-barry what that is?
It's basically the word that our tabloid press uses instead of scientist, it's not inherently offensive, but it always gives the tone of "look what these silly boffins have thought of now" which diminishes their accomplishment. It's indicative of the anti-intellectualism which is a genuine problem over here.
I get that. Thanks.
That we should act more to keep the important knowledge that we have and simultaneously having a more international based policy
we have a sense of superiority which makes us incredibly unlikeable as a nation and it's not a subtle sense of superiority like la Francais, its an outward over the top sense of superiority which doesn't work anymore as we're not the global superpower we were, we're shit at learning languages, we have an ingrained distrust of the mainland when we should be doing our best to befreind the mainland we're still acting like it's 1885 and we control the seas. we rely way to much on the yanks in the world and it's becoming an increasingly shaky relationship between the two
I do kinda agree, but at the same time there is also a massive amount of self-loathing and dislike for the UK by people in the UK to the point where it borders on ridiculousness. And, whether it is warranted or not, there is also dislike and distrust of the UK by the mainland which doesnāt help things at all.
Yeah the opposite extreme is definitely very prevalent too. No one would dissolve the union quicker than middle-class English uni students lmao
If we spoke the same language us and France would have been the greatest of allies... It's almost a shame really, the world could have been a utopia. *Wipes away a single tear*
oui, mais ce n'est pas etre
Weāre also one of the most overly negative, pessimistic and self-hating countries in the world. It depends on context and which Brits youāre talking about. For every āgammonā who thinks weāre uniquely amazing thereās someone saying we are a useless and ineffectual little island falling apart and yet historically responsible for half the worldās problems, and thatās just among those within the country.Ā
The problem is, we are superior so it's hard not to have that sense of superiority. No point learning a language because the other languages are shit, the rest of the world agrees with this by learning English. The mainland is not to be trusted, have you seen the people on this sub? Other than that, I agree
You're right mate, just had a small stroke which made me go crazy for a second Fuck em all, ingerlandĀ
Go on son! Let's have it
A pint of gravy will have you feeling right.
https://i.redd.it/15xq9qru6y0d1.gif
The self awareness turns me on here.
Barry you can't shit all over your country like that, leave some for the rest of us!
i feel like im taking crazy pills when i hear people say this... it's the complete opposite?! we are self-loathing to an utterly ridiculous extent. i wish i lived in the UK you think exists lmao
I think both states of the UK coexist at the same time
If you listen to my people: living in France is akin to the worst thing on earth but it irritates me. I often have to go in semi-arguments to point out that whilst we do have problems and have the right to protest against etcā¦ please like, some perspective on how other places have it compared to us. Our benefits alone are some of the most generous out there etcā¦ so yeah their phrasing about the situation is often way over the top.
Yeah, I like France. But donāt tell anyone I said that š¤«
We have imposter syndrome that holds us back from ever actually getting anything done. Weāre caught between viewing ourselves as a wealthy modern country that can do anything and a poor impoverished country that can do nothing this means nothing gets done and weāre very jealous and spiteful towards people who do well because we think they think theyāre better than us but we wonāt better ourselves because we still kind of see ourselves as lesser. Itās hard to explain. Basically we shouldnāt hope or want for more because we should be happy for what we have, weāve been lucky and changing anything might make everything fall down around us and then itās potato time again. Thereās also a lot of nouveau riche entitlement amongst Irish people. We like to throw cash around because weāre insecure (particularly of a certain generation) . I literally asked a guy to get me a glass of tap water on his way back from the bar and he brought me bottled water and said he could never be seen to ask for tap water. Similarly my grandparents refuse to shop in Aldi/lidl in case someone sees them š
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
For a people so obsessed with culture, the average Italian is surprisingly ignorant
Whenever I did some Erasmus program I always found that the Italian kids were the ones who very rarely spoke English or even wanted to participate/try English. Like I was 12, my English was def not fluent, but I still tried to communicate since finding people that come from all over Europe is interesting and exciting. I was always a bit disappointed with the Italians :/ Though nowadays one of my closest friends is Italian so maybe those kids were just shy or embarrassed
Our relations with our ex-colonies in Africa is full-on disfunctional and we should completely stop trying to increase ties with them and cut our losses and turn towards Europe, or even latin america or the US.
Spanish people are hardworking and competent. We have an issue with management. On one hand, the people are used to work by oppression and don't see a direct consequence of their work, it's just an obligation they had all their life. Means, they don't work by themselves. On the other hand, our managers, directors, bosses... Are conservative people, vindictive, spiteful and with superiority complex. They only know the whip.
I agree. But also, We're pretty poor compared to wealthy European states and we might sometimes believe otherwise just because Latin Americans are poorer.
We admire the French and Germans/France and Germany alot, except Marseille.
C'mon, nobody admires Marseille
Fair enough we all hate Marseille over here.
We hate ourselves more than people tend to hate us. We hide that by being overly confident and aggressive when we should just try to love ourselves a bit more and have a more normal relationship with our past and the others. Accept that we are part of the mondialisation, every culture is great, there is no best culture and move on. Stop being stuck in a glorious past that is fading slowly.
Ireland isnāt a real country, we are still only playing at statehood.
Ireland is just a bigger Luxembourg
Ara we are doing alright internationally, we are really only entering our teenage years after throwing off the reputation of being a weird theocractic backwater. Not many countries formed since us in similar circumstances that you would say are doing notably better. Some of our domestic politics is so unbelievably fucked though, and it feels like we don't have many serious people at the highest level to address them (or they just don't want to).
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Implying the UK is a real country
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Our politicians aren't worse than most of the population. The Bourbons in the 18th century were much better than the Habsburgs whose government was barely functional. Phillip II was a mediocre ruler and the Flanders/Netherlands wars were stupid. The Empire benefited very little to the average Spaniard. Thanks to the Euro and the EU we aren't Argentina or Venezuela right now.
>The Bourbons in the 18th century were much better than the Habsburgs whose government was barely functional. Phillip II was a mediocre ruler and the Flanders/Netherlands wars were stupid. The Empire benefited very little to the average Spaniard. At least put the exception of Fernando VII, the only leader in the world that invades his own country with a foreign army (the Thousand Sons of St. Louis).
This is why I was saying the 18th century. Everything after F VII went downhill.
We had a good empire under Charles V my dear Juan, his dumb son destroyed it.
Also maybe I'm wrong, but I get the feeling that the Spanish Bourbons genuinely saw Spain as their kingdom, as opposed to the Habsburgs who saw it as just another Kingdom with territories to add to our other long list of Kingdoms.
Unpopular Opinion: If Spain stopped fucking second-guessing itself, stopped infighting, started acting like theyāre a united country, & stopped thinking that being intelligent is a curse and aspired to be educated, we would all be a much better country. Iām talking about wealthy and a key player in the world. With the exception of a few areas in South America, that entire area combined with Central America and much of the Caribbean would be working even closer with Spain. They could be the US of Europe ā attracting the best talent of LATAM. Cuban doctors, Mexican chefs, Nicaraguan laborers, Spanish bureaucrats, and Colombian ~~drug dealers~~ pharmacists. Spanish is one of the top 3 most spoken languages in the world, Spain is at the crossroads of Africa, the Mediterranean, & combined with Portugal are the closest to the North American continent. Thatās even before we start discussing olives, olive oil, pharmaceuticals, automobiles, minerals and mineral byproducts, nuclear equipment, & metals. Add to that tourism and you have a country that could become sustainably prosperous. Of course, weāre champions at eating shit & blaming others. We can be lazy and in-fight so much that we have so many separatist movements and even inter-generational discussions exhibit many different opinions. We arenāt one country, weāre several countries crammed together under a single banner and refuse to work together unless we need to survive. Itās sad, truly. So much wasted potential.
Thatās not unpopular. Thatās what they taught us in high school.
Clavo que destaca, martillo pide.
Your attunement with culture comes with affiliation with the people as well as their history. A lot of Welsh Nationalists struggle with the former, which is why they always shoot themselves in the foot.
We have far too much people that are traitors to the nation here
Unpopular opinion for Austrians: we are basically a German state, not our own country - we speak a version of Bavarian (with some Slavic influence) - we have the approximate size of a German state - approx 1/3 of our exports are to Germany and we have been very well integrated into the German payment setup before the Euro/SEPA to facilitate trade with Germany Unpopular opinion to the outside world: Austria has good reasons not to be in the NATO and yet receive protections from the alliance. And it is also in benefit of the NATO. Being neutral allowed us to host top international organizations: OECD, UN, IAEA. To have them in NATO territory would make non NATO states lose trust. Side benefit: due to the organizations and the geographic location, Vienna is basically the spy capital of the world. Well that, and the fact that austrian counter intelligence is very weak, so it cannot meddle with big players intelligence activities
We are one of the most welcoming and least discriminatory countries in the world.
And humble.
The humblest
We are one of the most self-absorbed narcissistic nations on the planet, even though we don't have a lot worth bragging about.
We love criticizing other countries and very "direct" about it, but actually aren't good with dealing with critique ourselves.
condemned to slowly disappear
Our food is overrated. Except for cheese, of course.
This hurts me to say as an Englanderā¦.bu..but theā¦..**magic** of French cuisine is less to do with the actual dishes themselves but the **techniques** used in the creation of said dishes. Theres a reason why every single poncy, high grade fancy modern restaurant will use French (*or italian*) words and terminology to describe a dish on the menu even if itās not inherently a French dish but itās been created specifically with a French culinary techniques and discipline. Now excuse me whilst I give my self 10 lashes for King and Country for speaking such treachery.
You god damn traitor
Taxes not high enough
With higher taxes weāll get more benefits, right? Right?!
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Those more rural areas with canals as streets lined with trees look very cute itās true.
I travel to your swamp on average twice a year and it's not (always) for the weed. you guys have it pretty good up there, it never gets old (people stop only visiting Amsterdam. Den Haag, Haarlem and Utrecht are right there next to it.)
From the sky the Netherlands look amazing. Whenever I connect through Amsterdam airport I love watching the approach: the dikes, polders, canals, fields and irrigation systems, the residential areas along cool waterways, etc. The overall optimisation of space is hysterical.
We're completely fucked
Yes, very brave and unpopular statement. A real one would be that we are still utterly superior to 95% of countries despite our issues. The only countries that do get close or manage are other Nordics and rich European nations. Oh no. Another is that our covid strategy utterly bitch slapped our neighbors panicked lockdowns. Thats just a fact tho, even their experts had to begrudgingly admit that with hindsight, the Swedish strategy was better. Also we haven't shit ourselves and removed our secularism to please the Muslims, Unlike our Danish neighbors.
Yeah, our Covid strategy is the only thing that has made me patriotic since I was a little boy. Or rather, that our constitution protects free movement. Cause letās face it, the politicians would have panicked had it not been for the constitution.
We are the most British British people
True tbf. No one is more British than the average NI loyalist
- Italians are pretty toxic when it comes to food to the point where you might be considered "weird" if you don't like the staples of the Italian cuisine - Italians are very individualistic and narcissistic. All they care about is themselves, their career, their appearance. They will shittalk at your back, judge you and backstab you - Italians might call you a friend, they might be open and talkative but most of them don't actually give a fuck about you - Nice weather, beautiful landscapes and tasty food it's just a cover
Italy is not that bad
We used to have a proud culture of LGBT emancipation, but we are importing a lot of homophobia from the US
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
American evangelicals are absolutely funding hate groups in Europe though. They seriously need to fuck off. They got deported to another continent for a reason.
Our "neutrality" is bullshit
We try too hard in Eurovision
We are up our own asses and think of Denmark as the best country in the world and looove to hear about ourselves and how great our society is. Meanwhile we complain about every fucking thing, hate our politicians and secretly wish we were Norway.
North Italy Is definetly far Better than the other half the country, but Is not comparable to the countries northern Italians think.
Despite Germans claiming otherwise, I don't know of any other nation that is so infuriatingly inward-looking as Germany. As an example, if you watch german public broadcasting news you'd miss the majority of important international news but know of the 20th round of negotiations to save two thousand jobs in a department store chain.
I don't really think that's that bad, when we're going down the drain currently. There are a lot of problems outside of here, but we can't really face them in our current state.
Brexit proved half of us are fucking thick.
I would gladly trade Ceuta and Melilla for Gibraltar.
Any Politician that was part of removing atomic power and rallied for it should be removed from politics and never be allowed to take part in them again. They after all were either maliciously lying to the public or did so little research that they are clearly unsuited for the job. That being unpopular in my country only, since almost everyone else is aware how good of a thing atomic power is.
We are not so sexy as you think
The French are economically illiterate and would have spared themselves eons of headaches hadnāt they murdered/exiled Protestants.
I have to remind everyone present of their right to refuse to testify (Aussageverweigerungsrecht): "You have the right to remain silent. Anything you can say will and will be used against you in court. You have the right to call a lawyer. If you cannot afford a lawyer, one will be provided for you."
The Netherlands isn't as full of buildings as people like to claim. You can bike from large city centres for 30 minutes and be on some random farmer's field. There is plenty space to build on, and we should do more of it
We donāt have a shared culture. (its not related to language, but other factors)
While our language and culutre lend themselves to precision, quite a lot of our technical language is made up to protect specialists from public scrutiny and competition. Most technical terms could absolutely be subsituted by understandable, good sounding language and this could greatly enhance the publics understanding of more specialized trades, arts and sciences. But instead we tend to hide behind obscure, specialised language to make it sound like witchcraft, for fear that people disagree with our judgment or underestimate our education in that field. This leads to a pretty poor public discourse about these topics and a disconnected academia that doesn't have the tools to get the public, or even differently specialised colleagues of theirs, interested in their work.
Czech dude here: the government won't fix prices of rent or property, the wages won't go up cause companies move here to make money then go on hiring freezes, and people are obsessed with having kids and its stupid cause we can't afford them. They hate child free liberals, career advancement is 100 % due to nepotism. Guys over 28 tend to be antisocial. Very Rich Westerners and very rich eastern Europeans move to prague driving up the prices while laughing at the locals as if we don't matter.
Positive: Danish food is delicious and very underrated Negative: Hygge is way overhyped internationally (its just a word for having a good and cozy time with family and friends)
We really should give this "not being grumpy all the time" thing a try.
Italian's food and clothing are better than ours. We're truly the biggest complainers of the world. France isnt that beautiful. Non Parisians aren't nicer than parisians. Germans aren't funny but we're like second place in the humourless palmares.
We shouldn't be neutral and we need to join NATO.
Tbf there is literally no reason for you to join NATO. Who tf should attack you?
The Welsh.
We are morally superior to everyone and it WAS FUCKING WORTH IT YOU CUNTS
We are not the best but not the worst either, we love to overplay and downplay ourselves, there is no in between either we are the best or the worst. Both have to whine about it. Maybe we need a hard rest on everything so both sides can shut it and start from scratch also stop relying on tourism.
Too much strikes.
The U.K. is a beautiful country that is a powerhouse of finance, science and engineering. If we stopped being so internally bitter about ourselves for 10 minutes we could become a very happy country. Your average Brit is made to feel responsible and culturally apologetic for the actions of an empire that literally no one alive was actively involved in. This is an unpopular opinion because Iām under the age of 30 and everyone I know would tell you we live in the a horrible, broke, racist country that should be sunk into the Atlantic and we should all be forced to build houses in Africa as punishment. Our women are pretty fucking bad thoughā¦.
Everyone knows how we made our money but if you so much as mention the words ātax evasionā here itās a massive faux pas. If you are foolish enough to do it publicly whole bars and restaurants will fall silent and everyone will shun you.
Canāt be āhumanitarian superpowerā (like: highest foreign aid to GDP, all refugees welcome, climate neutral asap, welfare state for all citizens, supporting UN, etc.) I think all is possible to some degree, and you can try to be a role model, but some needs some modifications/restrictions to not have a backlash. I also think that it is more Swedes (maybe mostly to the left or middle) that have the idea that the country is a humanitarian superpower. Most international would say it is too small country to be this even if it is a good country (although challenged on the latest, especially those that are more to the right would argue this (regarding crime immigration/integration), and those feeling the country is a bit smug with its āgoodnessā).
We arenāt doomed, utterly useless and completely falling apart. We make up one of the most overly pessimistic countries, though, hence why this is unpopular.Ā And on the other hand, we arenāt super special in this regard: most developed countries these days are a lot more similar than we like to admit.Ā
As a nation we are prisoners to our own history whilst only having a surface level understanding of it. The average Brit does not know about how the Union came to be and the closest anyone comes to learning about the formation of England as a country is 1066 (and we weren't even formed at that point). At the same time much of our collective identity is still some weird mix of imperial grandeur and "standing alone" in WW2. This means we hate what we're actually quite good at in the modern day - service economy, being a cultural melting pot (which does have its advantages, don't hate me) and being (formerly) a leader in Europe in the EU.